Think about lawns for a minute. By lawn, I mean the dictionary.com meaning of the word, that is, “a stretch of open, grass-covered land, especially one closely mowed, as near a house, on an estate, or in a park”. Are lawns really an efficient use of land? Aren’t they just perceived assets that add minimal, if any, real value?
Lawns seem to be wasteful consumers of resources and energy. For example:
- Fresh, drinkable water is a limited resource, especially out here in California. To me, this means we should be as efficient as possible in terms of water usage, saving it for only necessary tasks like hydration, sanitation, and agriculture. Yet, I still see lawns getting watered, which I would think is being done for aesthetics. Now, I get that a “nice” lawn can add value to a house looking to be sold, but it’s only perceived value founded upon the premise that a “nice”/valuable property has a “nice” lawn, and that a “nice” lawn is a green one. But where’s the real value? What if we respected the natural landscape, and perceived that as nice? If we didn’t need to pump an unnatural amount of water to an area, just to grow grass for aesthetics? Could we implement something that doesn’t need extra water, or maybe even produces water?
- Lawn maintenance is full of expenses, and it really doesn’t seem like the expenses have any real valuable return, only perceived valuable return. Typically, fossil-fuel consuming machinery is used to mow and maintain the lawn through landscaping. It seems like we’re just putting energy into the lawn to take more energy out of it by cutting it down again. For what? Just the perceived value that a green, fresh-cut lawn has? Is this more valuable than our health and our environment?
In brief, I basically see a lawn as an inefficient land expense. I want to see more land turned into assets that generate real value, not perceived value.
Land has a huge potential. It is space. In the U.S., it is space that you can get creative with if you’re able to afford your own land. You could grow food, generate power, collect and treat water, etc. Think about it:
- If you start an organic garden or raise animals naturally, you can save money on food, improve your health by eating better and being more active (which would come naturally with either of these options), reduce the demand for non-local foods being shipped to your area (again, another waste of energy), and even learn something new – and knowledge always opens up more opportunities.
- If you generate your own power (for example, through solar panels, wind turbine, or hydro turbine), you could save money, maybe even make money from your local utility, and again, reduce wasted energy lost in power transmission via powerlines. Also, it’s another opportunity to learn something new.
- If you collect and treat water, you’d get similar benefits as from generating your own power.
These are just a couple of suggestions and ideas. How will you get creative with your lawn? Post your responses and ideas in the comments for this post.
Here’s my response, at the apartment I’m currently living in:
Planting some vegetables:
First iteration of thermal-mass condensation irrigation system prototype:
Conceptually, this is a system that extracts water from the air by using coldness to condense that water. This was inspired by Edward Linacre’s Airdrop Irrigation System, which won the 2011 James Dyson Award.
This prototype was NOT designed for efficiency – there is hardly any surface area and I’m unsure of PVC’s effectiveness in collecting condensation. I’d like to try a copper coil next (a coil will provide more surface area and better heat transfer than the PVC – in other words, the air will have more opportunity to condense by being in the pipe longer (a coiled piece is longer than a straight piece) and may condense better if the coldness is transmitted to it better via copper.
This first iteration produced an encouraging 1.75 tsp of water over the course of 4 hours while the humidity was around 50-60%. We’ll see how that improves!
Questions and suggestions are always welcome.
Note that this post is not just about lawns. Think about the concepts raised here and where else they apply.
Continue the discussion in the comments, below!
If ___________, then venture. 